


Who Said it Was a Fairy Tale?

by Emma_Wolf



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-29
Updated: 2013-09-04
Packaged: 2017-12-25 00:30:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,743
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/946531
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Emma_Wolf/pseuds/Emma_Wolf
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>(Takes place just after the season 2 finale.) After Mr. Gold and everyone head for Neverland and leave Belle to safeguard the town, Belle wonders how she will manage. She doesn't know anything about magic. She thinks back to her days as the queen's prisoner and the one person close enough to the queen to maybe have learned something about magic.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. No Magic in These Words

**Author's Note:**

> I'm playing around with this pairing because it surprised me I hadn't seen much of it. Formally titled "No Magic in Words" (I kind of strayed from that theme as I worked on this). After finishing, I think I realized why there isn't much Belle/Huntsman fic. It's sadcore. Parts 3 and 4 will follow soon.

She watched the ship fall through the portal like it was sinking, and her heart sank with it.

“Good bye, my love,” she whispered in a broken voice. It was cruel of him to wake her up only to leave her. But when had he ever not been cruel?

The scroll he had given her felt heavy in her hand. He had said it was a spell. How was she supposed to do magic? She didn’t know anything about it. She didn’t even know anyone who knew anything about magic who wasn’t on that damn boat.

When she had been the queen’s prisoner, she had often heard Regina casting spells or causing explosions that would shake the castle. On those days, she’d crawl to her bed and wrap herself in the thin blanket that was never able to keep out the cold. Magic, more than anything else, frightened her. Regina’s magic had a smell and a feeling that crept through the walls of the castle. It made Belle's skin crawl. Or she would wake up in a cold sweat from one of her nightmare and smell that smell. Like blood and something burning. Even in her sleep she'd smell the horrors of magic. Belle didn’t even know what Regina was up to exactly, but she had seen what magic had done to Rumplestiltskin, and it frightened her.

On better days, when the smell of magic had faded and Belle was able to sleep at night, she would steal a burnt twig from her small brazier that was never able to warm her cell, as small as it was. She’d press the charred end to any flat surface she could find—the walls, the floor, her blanket even—and write out what she could remember from her favorite stories. The library at Rumplestiltskin’s castle had seemed infinite, and she tried to cram as much of it as she could into her cell before she forgot and it slipped away all together.

Until the queen found out. Afterall, the queen, more than any other person, knew the power of the written word. It had been a book to teach her all that she knew about magic and power.

“What is this?” she fumed when she saw the words scrawled over the cell. She sounded deadly, like the snake that Belle had no doubt she used to kill her own husband.

Regina examined the walls carefully with a look on her face like she had just smelled something rotten. “‘And they lived happily ever after,’” she read with scorn. She laughed an evil cackle. “A fairy tale? You defiled my walls with a fairy tale? And here I thought Rumple had taught you something useful in your days as his slave. There’s no magic in these words.”

She spun on her heel and left in a swoosh of her black dress only to return a few moments later with a bucket of water and a brush. “I want this vandalism off my walls. It seems cleaning is the only thing Rumple taught you to do anyway. Might as well make yourself useful while you’re here.” She thrust the bucket to Belle, making sure to splash as much of the icy water as she could down Belle’s dress. “I’ll be back at dawn to make sure it’s all gone.”

She turned again, and Belle heard the familiar click letting her know her cell door was locked.

Sobbing, Belle erased her favorite stories until the water turned gray and her fingers froze in the frigid water. By the poor light from her ever-dimming fire, her eyes ached. It didn’t matter that there was no magic in the words. Regina didn’t need an excuse for cruelty.

The lock clicked again. Could it be dawn already?

It wasn’t the queen. It was someone else. One of her guards. Belle retreated to the corner of her cell. The guards didn’t need magic to be as cruel as the queen. But when Belle met this man’s eyes, he looked sorry to be there. He ran a hand over his scruffy chin. “I brought you more soap.” It sounded like something between an apology and a treat. “And another brush.”

He got down on his hands and knees and started scrubbing next to Belle. She knew he was trying to help, maybe trying to be nice, but it hurt all the same. Like it was another way for the queen to be cruel—making Belle thank someone for helping her erase the only thing to keep her sane.

“Why did she send you?”

“The queen doesn’t know I’m here.”

“Then why are you here?”

The guard gave a half smile, like he was sympathizing with her. “To help you. I’m no friend of the queen.”

Belle raised a skeptical eyebrow. “You wear her uniform.”

“Not by choice,” he said in a hiss. "I'm a prisoner too."

Belle nodded, but inside she was rolling her eyes. What did she care if one of the queen’s paid guards didn’t like his service? He had his freedom to walk in and out of her door. Did he really think she was going to feel sorry for him? If he wanted to help, he would have given her the key, not soap.

Nonetheless, she knelt down next to him and continued to scrub, trying to work the worst of it out of her threadbare blanket. She'd been beaten enough to know what she would be in for if she disobeyed the queen. They continued to clean the cell in silence until they heard a rooter announce that dawn wasn't far off.

“Thanks,” Belle said hoarsely.

“I’m sorry you had too…” He covered a yawn with dishpan hands. “I better leave before Regina comes back.” He slipped out of her cell and locked it behind him. Strange that he called himself a prisoner yet held a key. That paradox made her distrustful. Not that it mattered. Belle was in no position to trust or distrust. She was only grateful for the distraction that came with getting to know someone new and with having a new mystery to solve. Now that her walls had been restored to blank stone, she had nothing else to distract her.

Regina returned a few minutes after he had left to inspect the walls and floor. She hummed coldly as she saw them. “Maybe I’ll have you clean the rest of the castle.”

Belle would almost welcome that for the chance to get out of the small cell.

Regina examined Belle's worn and wet blanket. "This won't do," she said. "I can't have you catching cold. Not if you are to keep my castle presentable." She waved her hand and the blanket was replaced with a dry one. Cleaner, but just as thin and unable to provide any real protection from the cold nights.

Regina narrowed her eyes as Belle as though daring her to say something. When Belle remained silent, Regina said "You might say 'thank you,' my dear."

"Thank you."

"'Thank you, your majesty,'" Regina corrected.

"Thank you, your majesty," Belle parroted. She even added a little curtsy.

"Was that so hard?" 

That night, when her dinner was brought to her, Belle noticed slips of paper and a quill on her tray. Next to her water jug was a small pot of ink.

Belle had no doubts that he—the nameless guard—had been the one to give her the paper. Years later in Storybrooke, she still remembered his kindness. And now, with scroll in hand, she knew that he would be the one to help her with Rumple’s spell. Who else would know about magic than another one of the queen’s prisoners?


	2. Everyone has a name

Belle walked down from the dock to what was jokingly referred to as downtown Storybrooke—Granny’s diner on one side, Marco’s shop on the other. The road eventually led you down to town hall and the sheriff’s office with Archie’s practice and Mr. Gold’s shop somewhere in between. If you turned right, you’d hit “the other side of the tracks” where you’d find the Rabbit Hole. Some buried instinct started her down that path.

“What’s wrong?” a voice called from behind her. Ruby in platform shoes and still carrying a bag of garbage ran to catch up with her. How did she wait tables all day in those?

“Tamara,” Belle choked out between her sobs. “Has Henry.”

Confused, Ruby cocked her head. “That’s good, right? She’s going to be his stepmom. They should spend some time together.”

Belle shook her head and tried to calm down enough to make an intelligible sentence. “No. Neal’s dead. And Tamara and Greg. I don’t know who they are, but they took Henry through a portal.”

Ruby gasped and covered her mouth with her hands that had just held that leaking bag full of diner garbage. “Where’s Emma?”

“Gone.” Belle quickly filled her in regarding her restored memories, what had happened to the self-destruct diamond, Hook’s betrayal and subsequent return, and then how all of them up and left. Too much had happened since she saw Ruby last—and surely that has been just a few hours before.

“Mr. Gold, too?”

Belle nodded and wiped a tear from her face. She showed Ruby the scroll. “He gave me this before he left. He said it would protect the town from outsiders.”

Ruby took it hurriedly and unrolled the length of paper. She examined the thin writing and tried pronouncing some of the words. But Belle could tell the whole thing looked foreign to her. “What do we do with it?” she asked finally.

Belle shrugged helplessly. “Find someone who knows about magic.”

Ruby rolled her eyes. “Mr. Gold and Regina are gone. Who does that leave who knows anything about magic? But if he left you the spell, surely he thought you could handle it.” She stood up straight looking sure of herself. “And I have curse-memories of séances at middle school sleepover parties. I think we can figure it out.”

Belle laughed, wondering how serious Ruby was about the curse-memories. Ruby seemed to have drawn a better lot in the whole curse business. At least she was still with someone who loved her, even if the curse made them fight. Belle, as Lacey, only had memories of alcoholism and being institutionalized by her father.

Without a better plan, they took the spell to Ruby’s room in the inn. They lit candles and sat across from each other on the carpet.

“Are you sure this is right?” Belle asked skeptically. She was overwhelmed by the smell of patchouli and sandalwood.

“Yes! I told you! Curse-memories! Séances! Since Regina was the one to curse me, she probably knew what she was talking about, right?”

“Right,” Belle repeated, though the plan sounded questionable at best.

“Is that a ‘p?’” Ruby asked as she squinted at the scroll.

“I think it’s an ‘s.’”

Frustrated, Ruby tossed the scroll to Belle. “I can’t read your boyfriend’s handwriting.”

She narrowed her eyes at Ruby then focused on the scroll. She didn’t want to admit it, but she couldn’t read it either. She tried rolling a couple of the words off her tongue, but nothing happened. Finally, realization came to her. “This isn’t my boyfriend’s handwriting. It’s Regina’s. Regina made this spell.”

Ruby’s eyes grew wide in alarm. “We shouldn’t play around with it then!” She snatched it back from Belle and held it over a candle. “Should we burn it?”

“No!” Belle cried and grabbed it back. “Rumple gave it to me, so it can’t be all bad.”

“Because he’s a paragon of virtue,” Ruby said flippantly but muttered a “sorry” when she saw Belle’s hurt face.

“Let’s find someone who knows about her. Who worked for her back where we’re from.”

Ruby shook her head. “No one who works for her made it over. At least, no one who’s admitting it.” She looked at Belle and bit her lip, trying to proceed sensitively. “Do you remember anyone from…you know, when you were there?”

“There was one man.” Having been cursed so many times, remembering and forgetting, again and again, Belle’s memories—her real memories—were fuzzy.

“What was his name?” Ruby asked hopefully.

 

 *****

The next day, the queen did let Belle out of her cell. To clean the rest of the castle, that is. With iron chains around her ankles, Belle swept, dusted, washed dishes, emptied chamber pots, and generally fulfilled whatever whim Regina had until late at night.

“It’s not so different from your time at Rumplestiltskin’s, is it now?” Regina asked with a sinister smile. She ran a finger down Belle’s exhausted face.

Belle shivered and turned her head away. She was too tired to think of a witty retort. One that she may have had for Rumple.

“I see,” Regina said as her smile faded from her face. “I’m expecting a guest,” she announced grandly. “See that the north wing is ready for him with a fire going strong in the bed chamber.”

Belle could barely conceal her shock. “Now?”

Regina pretended to look sympathetic. “Oh? Is making a bed too difficult a task for a noble one like you?” She turned away from Belle without waiting for an answer. She gave an ostentatious wave of her hand, and Belle found herself holding a pile of thick woolen blankets, heavy down pillows, and a shining chamber pot on top. From the smell of it, it hadn’t been emptied. If it was so easy for the queen to just wave her hands and make blankets appear, she wondered why the queen couldn’t have just made them appear directly on the bed and cut out the middleman.

Belle carried the stack of comfort that she would never see again to the north wing, careful to balance it all so that the pot would not tip. The queen did that bit on purpose, she knew. She could have just as easily conjured a clean chamber pot for Belle to carry, but where would the fun be in that?

“Let me help you.”

Startled, Belle almost let it all crash to the floor. But she regained her balance and turned to find the same guard from the other night rushing towards her with his arms outstretched. She wanted to say “no thanks, I’ve got it,” but it wasn’t worth it for a prisoner to have that sort of pride.

“Thank you, again,” she said flatly. “Do you have a name?”

“No,” he said as flat as her. He grabbed the chamber pot and flung its contents out of the window and tucked a pillow under his arm.

“Everyone has a name.”

“Not me.”

“What do people call you?”

“The queen calls me her pet.”

“What do the other guards call you?”

“They just sneer,” he said impassively. “Because I’m her pet.”

They reached the north wing. Belle spread the warm blankets over the bed while the guard fluffed up the pillows. He then turned his attention to the fireplace in the corner and began a small fire for the queen’s guest. Belle sat herself by the fire, enjoying the heat. She had forgotten what it felt like to be warm.

The guard sank to his knees next to her, throwing small sticks on the fire to build it slowly.

Not one to let things go, Belle pressed him again. “Surely you have a name. What did your parents call you?”

He shrugged his broad shoulders. “I never knew them. I was raised by wolves. And they just called me _Aaahhhooooooo_!”

Belle hit him in the leg and giggled. Then she caught his green smiling eyes and blushed. He looked down at her with something strange in his eyes. One part affection, and one part indifference. Belle felt disappointed, like she was expecting something else. Maybe the way Rumple used to look at her. She cleared her throat and turned away.

“What can I call you then?”

He shrugged. “Maybe it’s better if you don’t call me anything.”

“I know! Graham.”

“Graham?” he asked doubtfully.

“Mmm hmm,” she said with a nod. “You remind me of my brother. He always looked after me. That was his name.”

“Was? What happened to him?”

“He died,” she said simply. “In the Ogres War. I’m sorry. Does it bother you to be named after the dead?”

The guard shrugged. “It’s easier to say than _Aaahhhooooooo_!”

Belle laughed again. It was a merry laugh. One that she hadn’t used since at least before Regina took her, if not earlier. It was certainly not one Gaston heard. Gaston had tried to be witty and charming, but it often came at the expense of someone less fortunate than him. Belle hated that sort of humor, so the laughter he elicited was forced and dull. Not that he ever noticed.

“I’m flattered. Graham,” he said trying it out. “It’ll do. Thanks,” he said and kissed Belle’s forehead.

Belle blushed again and brought her attention to the flames in the fireplace.

Was it just because she was being held captive? She had told Rumple that if she was never to know anyone else in this world, she wanted a chance to get to know him. And she fell for him. He was her true love. Their kiss proved it. How then could she feel anything for this man, a guard in her captor’s castle?

She smiled gently and reached for his hands. They were calloused from his own labor under the queen. She closed her eyes and thought about how they would feel over her body and contrasted that with how she imagined the touch of Rumple’s own golden fingers.

Before Belle had time to think about the turmoil of her emotions, Regina burst in. “Haven’t you finished yet?” she said haughtily. When she saw the Graham—her pet—next to Belle, she sneered. “My guest is about to arrive, and I don’t want him to have to see the help.” She looked down her nose at the two of them, emphasizing the fact that they were less than. Not even bothering to pretend to be jealous that Belle—a prisoner—had attracted the attention of her pet. It didn’t matter when she controlled both their lives.

“Huntsman, I’ll meet you in my boudoir. And you,” she said, grabbing Belle’s arm, “come with me.”

Regina nearly dragged Belle back to her cell, walking at a fast clip. “You’re to stay in your room while my guest is here. Unless I need you for something, of course. Since I’ve learned how adept you are at menial tasks.”

She threw Belle back into her cell and locked it. “And I don’t want to hear a peep from this room while my guest is here, is that understood?” Regina talked to her through the bars of the door as though she were a troublesome child.

“Yes, your majesty,” Belle said and stared hard at the walls in her cell. If she stared hard enough, she imagined she still saw the words written there in faded charcoal.


	3. Who Said it Was a Fairy Tale?

Belle had expected Regina would ignore her while her guest of some importance was present, but it appeared as though she was wrong. At least, in the beginning. As though Regina wanted to humiliate Belle, she came to her cell frequently to ask her attend to a need of her mysterious guest’s.

“Go chop wood for the fire in my guest’s room.”

Or “my guest’s palliasse is too soft. Go remedy that.”

Or “it’s too dark in my guest’s room. Go fetch him some more candles.”

The only bright side, if there was a bright side to imprisonment, was that with Regina so busy with her guest, Graham—the queen’s pet—had time available. He would help her with some of her chores, or he’d come to Belle’s cell and they would at least keep each other company.

“What were you before you came here?”

“Free,” Graham said simply.

“Right. Well, what did you do with your freedom?”

“Hunt.”

“You don’t want to talk about your past?”

Brooding, he shrugged. “What’s the point? There’s no going back. Not for me.”

“You have the key,” Belle remarked. “What’s stopping you? What did you get in exchange for these liberties?”

“I’m not like you, Belle,” Graham said touchily. “I didn’t save my land, if that’s what you’re asking.”

Belle had told Graham only the barest details of her past—that her town was losing the Ogres War and that she had given her life in exchange for assistance. The rest of the truth—that she had been Rumplestiltskin’s servant and lover—had seemed too fantastic. “I’m sorry, I don’t mean to pry. I just don’t know what else there is for two prisoners to talk about. And I can’t understand…”

“Why I stay? Simple. The queen holds my life in her hands. My heart at least. Literally.”

“You love her?” Belle asked in a horrified whisper, pulling away from Graham, for the first time thinking that perhaps his kindness to her was a trap and part of Regina's scheming.

“No, nothing like that,” he scoffed. He placed his hand on Belle's leg to calm her. Slowly, she relaxed and sat back down on her bed next to him. “She took my heart from my chest when I refused to kill Snow White.”

Belle drew her hand over her own beating heart as though trying to protect it. “What?” she gasped in disbelief.

“You’ve seen her magic. Don’t make me say it again.” A dark shadow passed over his face. “Everything that you fear about her is true. And worse.” He took Belle’s hand from her chest and brought it to his own. “You don’t feel it beating, do you?”

She didn’t. She shivered and drew back her hand as though Graham were poison.

She cleared her throat and turned to the other part of the puzzle. She had heard Rumple say the name “Snow White” once or twice. Rumple seemed to have cared about her in the way he cared about anyone—curious to see how she would fit into some part of his larger plan. Beyond that, Belle didn’t know anything about her. “Who was she? Snow White, I mean.”

“A princess. The queen’s step daughter.”

“Did you love her?”

“I barely knew her.”

“Was your sacrifice worth it?”

“I don’t know.” Graham’s green eyes grew cold. He stared at a fixed point on the far wall and pulled mindlessly at the ties of his arm bracers. “Was yours?”

Without a second thought, Belle nodded. “My people are safe. That’s all that matters. But I didn’t count on the queen.”

“If you had?”

Belle pursed her lips and thought about it for a minute. “Yes, I’d give my life for my people.”

Graham swallowed hard and looked down to his feet. He seemed somehow intimidated by her. She had given her life for her people’s safety, and what has he done? Cried over a few dead deer? Sure, he saved the life of a princess, but with Regina’s incessant plotting, he knew it would be only a matter of time before his sacrifice would be for nothing. In his days as her pet, he’d never seen anyone get the better of the queen.

“I never got a chance to say thank you,” Belle said suddenly, pulling Graham out of his hopeless reverie.

“For what?”

“For the paper and quill the other day. After,” she gestured to her clean floor and walls.

He nodded. “Those were beautiful stories, Belle.” His voice was hoarse, but it still gave her a thrill to hear him say her name. And finally he met her eyes. “What was the one about the girl breaking the enchantment of the beast? How did it end?”

“You read them?” she asked, embarrassed and touched at the same time.

He bit his lower lip apologetically but asked again. “Did true love break his curse?”

It was Belle’s turn to be pithy. “No.”

“What happened?”

It broke her heart to tell him the ending. “He sent her away.”

“I thought fairy tales were supposed to end with ‘and they lived happily ever after.’”

“Who said it was a fairy tale?”

Graham sensed her pain and was envious of it. Without a heart, he felt nothing. No sorrow, but also no love. He leaned towards her and put his mouth on hers, wishing his kiss could take away her pain and bring it to himself. Anything would be better than nothing.

For her part, Belle closed her eyes and let the broken man kiss her. She knew it wouldn’t be the love that would break an enchantment, but it might just be a feeling that would make her sacrifice less terrible to bear.

The cell door flew open. “I’ve been looking all over the castle for you.” The queen’s shrill voice cut across the cell and forced Belle and Graham apart as surely if it had been a blade.

“I’ve been here,” Belle said as though butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth.

“I was talking to him, dear.”

Graham tried to think of a lie, some reason for him to be in Belle’s cell. “I was about to help her chop wood.”

“Is that what you’re calling it?” The queen’s eyes were narrowed in hate and jealousy. “I’m sure I don’t need to tell you what will happen to you if I catch the two of you like this again.”

Hangdog, Graham slinked out of the cell. Belle had never seen a man so defeated. Even when being tortured to death by Rumple, Robin Hood had maintained defiance. The queen had broken Graham completely.

That defeat was what first came to Belle’s memory sitting on the floor in Ruby’s room.

“He was broken,” she told Ruby. “Completely overcome by the queen. Completely under her control. He wasn’t a guard in her castle. He was a prisoner too. But he had more freedoms.”

“Sydney Glass?” Ruby asked. “I don’t know what he did in the Enchanted Forest, but here he was certainly the mayor’s bitch.”

Belle shrugged. “What does he look like?”

Ruby took out a sketch pad and a pencil and began to draw him. His short curly hair, his oval face, the intensity his eyes could have when you crossed him.

Belle shook her head. “No. His face was more square. More boyish.”

Ruby flipped a page and started over. “Emma put me to work at the police station once. Answering phones, solving crime. She didn’t get me doing sketches though.”

“Clearly she missed out.”

She had a rough outline of a face on the page. “What else do you remember?”

“His eyes were green.”

Ruby glared at Belle. “I’m working with pencil here.”

“Right, sorry. Facial hair,” she said, bringing her hand to her own chin to demonstrate. “A mustache and a goatee. Scruffy. Would make you think of a wolf.” She stole an apologetic glance toward Ruby.

Ruby replied with a wilting one. “I am what I am. Don’t apologize.”

“Do you have any brothers? I remember he told me something about wolves.”

She shook her head. “Not that I know of.”

Belle looked back to the sketch. “His hair was longer. A little bit wavy. His jaw more pronounced.”

Together they worked, Ruby sketching, Belle making suggestions, and Ruby erasing and starting again. Until at last, Ruby looked at the drawing and gasped. “I know him.”


	4. A Fight Against the Inevitable

Graham didn’t come back to see her the next day. Or the day after that. Or the one after that one. Nor did the queen have any menial task for her. Belle figured her solitary confinement was an easy way for the queen to keep them apart. A few times she tried to write down another story or two on the parchment Graham had given her, but mostly she spent her time being bored, trying not to wish she was back emptying chamber pots, and promising herself that if she ever got free of she would never fall in love with another coward or a broken man. And all the while, the smell of magic permeated the air, making Belle sick.

Then on the fifth day a guard came for her. She tried not to let herself hope when she heard the key turn in the lock, but she did and was disappointed when she saw it wasn’t Graham. “The queen wants you to muck out the stables.”

“Isn’t she afraid I’ll hop on a horse and escape?”

In reply, the guard showed her the heavy irons she would wear around her legs that would allow her only to take the smallest of baby steps. But she drew herself up and said haughtily, “I’ll ride side saddle then.”

The guard laughed heartily, showing off a mouthful of rotting teeth.

 

*** 

Ruby looked up at Belle, regret in her eyes. “I know him,” she said again in a remorseful whisper.

Belle looked at the picture Ruby had drawn. She had captured the Huntsman perfectly. Belle touched the penciled lines that made up his chin and could almost feel the rough beard. “That’s him! Who is he? Take me to him!”

Ruby picked herself off the floor and ran to her computer. She opened a browser and went to Google.

“Will you tell me what’s going on?” Belle asked, a little puzzled and a little annoyed. “I haven’t seen him since the curse. Who is he, Ruby?”

***

Belle didn’t make it as far as the stables. The chains chaffed at her ankles. She stopped at the kitchen garden to rest and rub her sore legs.

“Morning,” a voice called from behind her.

Alarmed, Belle turned. Graham was there cradling a calf in his arms.

“What happened to him?” She asked.

“Don’t know really. His mother rejected him.” Graham was trying to feed him using a cow’s horn with leather tied around the bottom point. “Regina says I shouldn’t bother. That he’ll end up in the pot anyway. That I’m in a fight against the inevitable. But I guess that’s what I do.”

Belle shuffled over to him. “You’re thinking of Snow White.” She reached out to the calf and stroked his smooth, brown hide.

“I saved her life one time, and for what? As we speak, the queen is learning more magic.”

“You gave her a chance. That’s all you could do.”

Graham nodded, still sullen and brooding. “I gave her a whistle. I told her to use it if she’s in trouble.” He laughed humorlessly at his own folly. “What good will a whistle be against her?” He set the calf and the homemade bottle of milk down. “I’m sorry I haven’t been to see you. The queen has been keeping me busy.” He spat out her title as though it were something vile in his mouth.

“You missed it. I threw a great party in my cell the other night. All my stories’ characters were there.”

Graham moistened his lips and looked into Belle’s warm blue eyes. He wanted to feel something. If he concentrated hard enough, he almost did. “She was trying to keep us away from each other.”

“That would explain why she hasn’t been letting me out of my cell to perform any manual labor. I wonder why she let me out now.”

Graham shrugged and looked away. “Her guest is leaving soon. Maybe she needed you to prepare his horses.”

Belle looked down at her irons and pitchfork like she had forgotten the reason for her being outside in the first place. “Right,” she said. She began to turn to continue down the path taking baby step after baby step but stopped again. “Who is this mysterious guest of hers anyway?”

“You don’t know?” Graham asked in disbelief

“I’m not exactly kept in the know.”

He could barely raise his voice above a whisper. “The one who taught her all her magic. The Dark One.”

 

***

Finally finding what she was looking for, Ruby pushed her laptop to Belle. “There, you see!”

Belle looked at the computer screen and saw warm green eyes staring back at her. The eyes she had asked Ruby to draw.

“I didn’t know he was your friend. I’m so sorry, Belle.”

 

***

Belle dropped her pitchfork and turned to Graham. “You’ve got to get me out of here! Do you have the key?”

“Relax, Belle,” Graham said as he stood up slowly and brushed the straw off his pants. “He can’t hurt you.”

“No,” Belle implored. “Take me to him. Please. He’ll save me. He’ll save both of us. I swear it. Do you have the key?”

Graham shook his head sadly. “No, Belle. What?” He was confused and at a loss for words. “He’s the Dark One, Belle. Rumpelstiltskin. He won’t help anyone unless there’s something in it for him.”

“Graham, please. I don’t have time to explain. Just take me to him.”

Looking determined, Graham nodded his head. “If you’re wrong, the queen will have both our hides.”

“I’m not wrong.”

Effortlessly, he swung Belle over his shoulder. “I’ll take you to the stables. We’ll wait for him there.”

“No! Take me to the entrance hall! We’ll catch him before he leaves.”

“But Regina will see,” Graham protested.

“It won’t matter!” Belle insisted.

But Graham ignored her and started running to the stables. “This is better. Closer. Trust me.”

 He ran faster down the muddy path to the stables. They were almost there when two horses came crashing down the path, followed by four more, all pulling the Dark One’s carriage on its way back to the Dark Castle and splattering mud in their wake. Graham ran off the road into a hedgerow as the horses whipped by them.

“No!” Belle shrieked again. She threw herself off Graham’s shoulders and tried to hobble back on the road.

“You want to get yourself killed?” Graham hissed as he pulled her into the bushes.

Belle struggled out of his grip and stumbled back, chains tripping her. “Rumplestiltskin!” she screamed. Her cry was drowned out by the sound of the horses whinnying. “Come back!”

She sank to her knees in the mud and sobbed.

 

***

“He can’t hear you, Belle,” Regina said smoothly, echoed by Graham’s voice far away. “Now tell her to come back inside. Neither of you is going anywhere.”

With a satisfied smile, she put Graham’s heart back in its box and the box back inside her cabinet.


End file.
